Abdul Rahman al Saud
Abdul Rahman al Saud, also known as Vulture or the Blood Vulture, is a member of the Saudi royal family and friend to Rashid "Scimitar" Abbas. History Early History Abdul Rahman al Saud is the descendant of the Chief of a Saudia Bedouin tribe, which was gifted by Genghis Khan one of the six Pillars of the Machine. As such he was entitled to the First Pillar. During his life, Abdul became an intelligence officer for his country, taking the call-sign Vulture. At some point he became close friends with Rashid "Scimitar" Abbas, the UAE's Chief Sheik's son. In the investigations of brutality taking place at certain Iraq prisons, one known as the Blood Vulture of Abu Ghraib prison was discovered to have performed extreme tortures on prisoners. While Vulture denied the accusations, and though there was little doubt that he was the one that committed those atrocities, there was no evidence to back the claims up. Some time after the mission to restore the Golden Capstone in 2006, Vulture and Scimitar joined forces with Jack "Wolf" West Sr and Mao Gongli to find the remaining Pillars and restore the Machine to prevent the Dark Sun from destroying life on Earth. In exchange for their help, Vulture would get his First Pillar charged and keep its reward, knowledge, while the Americans and Chinese would share the Second. In order to do so, they needed the Firestone of the Golden Capstone, possessed by Wolf's son, Jack West Jr. Through his connections in the Saudi intelligence services, Vulture attempted to use Jack adopted daughter, the Oracle of Siwa Lily West, to locate Jack's farm, and thus the Firestone. However, Jack remained extremely cautious and never used the same route to bring her home from her boarding school. Eventually Vulture discovered Lily had a friend, Alby Calvin, and instead decided to have him followed instead. This soon produced the location of Jack's home, and Vulture passed the intel on to Wolf and Mao. The Six Sacred Stones After the failure of the Chinese to take the Firestone and capture Lily West, Scimitar's father requested he join him and his brother as Jack hosted a meeting of nations to discuss the threat of the Dark Sun. Scimitar informed his allies of this development, and soon Vulture and Scimitar decided to infiltrate the Coalition to find out what they knew and piggyback off their efforts. When Scimitar and Vulture arrived at the Burj al Arab, Jack was suspicious of Vulture due to the alleged actions at Abu Ghraib, however Scimitar's vouching for Vulture and the Saudi's offer of information to contribute to their cause caused the Australian to back down. Once the meeting began, Vulture listened as Jack informed the group of the importance of the Machine's restoration through the use of the six Pillars and the Six Sacred Stones. Vulture divulged his possession of the First Pillar and what he knew of Xintan prison where Max Epper was being held. As the meeting drew to a close, Abbas alerted the gathering to a cargo plane looking to crash into the Burj, and so Vulture and the others rushed to evacuate before the plane crashed. Because the Coalition's primary expert on the Machine, Max "Wizard" Epper, had been taken prisoner by Mao at Xintan prison, Vulture and Scimitar went along with Jack's plan to liberate him and Tank. Hiding in the nearby snow banks until the prison's Hind gunship landed nearby, Vulture helped to take their chopper so that the team could use it to make their way to Witch Mountain to retrieve the Philosopher's Stone. After claiming the Sacred Stone, Jack told Vulture to arrange for his family's Pillar to be brought to Mortimer Island so that they could cleanse it, and Vulture coldly agreed while noting Jack's reputation for boldness. Upon meeting up with Zoe's team at Mortimer Island, Vulture went to speak to his men who had brought his Pillar, and then joined the procession as they identified the location of the First Vertex at Abu Simbel, learned the Pillar-laying dates from the Killing Stone of the Maya, and cleansed the two Pillars they had with the Philosopher's Stone. With the first components they needed in hand, Vulture joined the rest of the team as they headed out to lay the first Pillar. As the team headed out to Abu Simbel on the Halicarnassus, Vulture asked Jack whether he believed they could trust Iolanthe Compton-Jones for her full cooperation in the mission (knowing that she was in fact allegedly on Wolf's side), leading to a discussion regarding the Royal European Houses. While the rest of the team ventured out onto Lake Nasser to find the Vertex entrance and lay the Pillar, Vulture and Scimitar were left on the docks to act as their rear guard. However, the pair took the opportunity to slip away while the Egyptian military forces hired by Wolf moved in to claim the Pillar for Vulture. Unfortunately Wizard, Lily, Zoe and Alby were able to escape with the Pillar, and so Vulture and Scimitar joined Wolf at his mine in Ethiopia where he held the captive members of the team. Vulture confronted Wolf to admonish him for failing to secure his Pillar, however Wolf reminded him that he was only supposed to get his First Pillar after helping him to retrieve the charged Second Pillar. After reassuring the Saudi that they would locate Wizard and the Pillar, Wolf ordered Vulture to set up drone searches and a bounty for African nations to seek out Wizard's team, and close off all access to the second Vertex beneath Table Mountain. The Five Greatest Warriors Vulture was in Cape Town during the placing of the second Pillar beneath Table Mountain, and one it was laid Vulture, Scimitar, Wolf, Rapier, Mao and Iolanthe met up to discuss their next move in the Machine's restoration. Vulture was pleased to finally have his Pillar returned to him fully charged with its reward, and as he and Scimitar prepared to depart, Vulture pledged to offer his assistance should Wolf need him again, though his temporary allies knew better than to trust him explicitly. A couple of months later, Vulture and Scimitar decided to rattle the Coalition team's cage by giving them another problem to deal with, and proceeded to kidnap Alby and his mother. As they flew off on Vulture's private plane and revealed the kidnapping to the Coalition, Vulture took pleasure in taunting Alby as he revealed how he had used the boy to locate Jack's farm and what he knew of his relationship with his father and brother. When Scimitar began threatening Alby with the knife, Vulture ordered him to back off, but the arrival of a pair of Russian fighters distracted everyone. As his pilots informed him that the Russians wanted them to change their course, Vulture decided to comply when they firing warning shots at them. Being forced to land at a dam in eastern Russia, Vulture and the others were captured by the Russian royal known as Carnivore, who had the Arabians shackled in his dam's observatory until all the people involved in the Machine's restoration was gathered. Carnivore revealed his intention to take the Pillars and their rewards, and to manipulate everyone else into completing the Machine's restoration for him. After seeing Paul Robertson executed for refusing to hand over the second Pillar, Vulture reluctantly agreed to hand over his first Pillar. Soon Carnivore tasked Vulture, Scimitar and Mao with locating the final Pillar, and Vulture was surprised that the Russian knew of his people's whispers about the whereabouts of Jesus Christ's tomb, but affirmed that he knew by repute, and soon Vulture and the others headed off. Thanks to the rumours his people had spoken of over the years, Vulture and his allies were soon able to pinpoint the tomb within an abandoned Roman salt mine in the Dead Sea. However, Vulture and Scimitar were aware of a false Pillar guarding the true one, and allowed Mao to take it away with the intention of claiming the real one and placing it themselves. When the pair returned to the chamber, they found Jack, Lily and Iolanthe in the midst of finding the Pillar, and cut off their exit before threatening them with crossbows to get them to hand the real Pillar over, with Vulture offering to spare the girl's life if Jack complied. However, Pooh Bear and Stretch arrived behind them, and soon Vulture engaged Stretch in close-combat. Vulture's blade-wielding skills far outmatched the sickly Israeli, and soon he managed to stab him in the back, taking joy in taunting Stretch before manacling him to a slave wheel with the promise of cutting his head off in front of Lily. Vulture began moving in to assist Scimitar, but spotted the C4 Pooh Bear had on the knife he held beneath his friend's throat and kept back as it detonated. Repulsed by Scimitar's disfigured jaw, Vulture turned to deal with Pooh Bear, only to catch Scimitar's thrown knife in his throat. Unable to breathe, Vulture collapsed and quickly suffocated to death. Personality Vulture is as sly as they come, willing to ally with one to get what he desires before cutting them loose once his ends have been achieved. His knowledge of blade usage and torture methods makes him a dangerous enemy, and an equally dangerous ally. Few can claim to have this man's trust, but as royal of Saudi Arabia, he expects respect, not earning it. Trivia . Category:Huntsman Characters Category:Saudi Arabian Characters Category:Characters Category:Deceased Characters Category:The Six Sacred Stones Category:The Five Greatest Warriors Category:Antagonists